Tricot by aforestdesign

I came across Portuguese clothing line aforestdesign while still living in Lisbon and was really impressed by their range, in particular their casual wear that employed a pattern reminiscent of cable knitting, but that pattern was usually printed or sewn on, not knitted - see an image of their 'flat knitted' limited edition sweater below. Just before Christmas aforestdesign teamed up with Portuguese textiles company Piodão to create the Tricot rug, a rug employing that same cable-knit style, but this time in hand tufted New Zealand wool. The result is great: a simple but beautifully-textured rug that brings some sartorial style into your home :)

Frida Kahlo Dolls

I spent some time at the recent Christmas Cracker in Smithfield hawking TILEWATCH to whoever I could. When not selling my ware (singular) it was great to take a look around the many stalls and see what fantastic food, clothing, accessories, furniture, books and Christmassy stuff people had to offer. One of the coolest things I spotted was the range of Frida Kahlo dolls made by textile designer Guadalupe Cabrera. Cabrera had a whole range of pieces handmade in Dublin, such as quilted and appliqué cushions, baby bonnets, Christmas angels, wall-mounted pieces and more, but it was the Kahlo dolls that shone above all others. Made to include the bright colour, floral headdresses and monobrow associated with the Mexican artist, the dolls are such unique objects, and ideal for any art-lovers out there :)

Patterns by Ursula Celano

With a background in tourism, Irish-born Ursula Celano has long since had an interest in products that aim to express Ireland and Irishness. This and an interest in drawing and pattern-making led her to start her own range of products - beginning with notebooks - almost two years ago. Since then her range has grown to include pencilcases, tea towels, cards and aprons. Above all, my favourites are her bags and purses which employ bright, bold patterns containing elements of Ireland's landscape and lifestyle.

African Lookbook

Launched this summer, African Lookbook is a website and online store that explores and celebrates creativity across the vast continent of Africa. Founded by two Americans who have lived and worked there, African Lookbook compiles oral histories (interviews, to you and I) with African creatives and stocks a growing range of great products and projects in its store. Highlights so far include men's knitwear by Laduma Ngxokolo, pictured above and below, brightly patterned parasols by Gareth Crowdon (further below) and a wall-mounted piece by Michael Van Heerdan entitled 'The Building Blocks of Africa' (pictured at the bottom). There's a brightness and vibrancy about much of the stock on the website, and its great to see an initiative looking to share with the rest of the world the fantastic creative output of the African continent. Expect to be hitting the 'Add to Cart' button often :)

Copenhagen Kickstarter

Thanks to a post over on Fast Company I came across MUUSE, a fantastic new fashion site based in Copenhagen. MUUSE is fashion retail with a difference: work from carefully-selected emerging designers can be bought in one of three ways: pre-order, ready-to-wear or tailor-made. Ready-to-wear pieces are stocked and ready for shipping, while tailor-made pieces are produced to your measurements. Pre-order works a little like Kickstarter or Fund It: only when a certain number of people reserve their garment is the piece put into production.

Sandra Suy

I recently stumbled upon the work of Barcelona-based fashion illustrator Sandra Suy over on Australian blog Limeshot. Suy's work instantly won me over, with her ability to mix intricate drawing (she's clearly a very skilled draftsperson) with blocky printed elements and other textured details. And triangles. I'm a sucker for brightly-coloured triangles. Check out her range of editorial and personal work over on sandrasuy.com.

Storytelling

Last night saw the opening of Storytelling: a joint exhibition by costume and prop designers Harmless Creatures and illustrator and fashion designer Kitty Moss in two locations in Dublin. Obviously I couldn't make it, but Kitty and the Creatures were kind enough to send me some images and a film so I didn't miss out entirely :)

Drawing Fashion

Images via Forever Making Lists and Private

Also showing in the Design Museum right now is Drawing Fashion, an exhibition charting the development of fashion illustration over the last century or so. It's a well-designed show with a great selection of beautiful illustrations from 1920s Vogue covers by LePape (above left), 60s and 70s illustrations by Antonio (above right is for Karl Lagerfeld) through to contemporary representations of fashion by Mats Gustafson (below), Francois Berthoud (bottom) and others. You can't help but notice how fashion illustration is a medium that can express a mood or atmosphere as adeptly as fashion photography. In fact, in the way that photography can realistically represent colour, fabric, form and so on, illustration is liberated; and judging by what's on display in the Design Museum, can elevate itself to an art form of its own, almost independent of the fashion it attempts to describe.

Leaf Rugs

Designed by Michael Scott and Partners and completed in 1953, Busáras (Dublin's central bus station) seems to be a love-it-or-hate-it kind of building (one of quite a few from that era still standing in the city). At the time, its International Modernist style was a lot for locals to take, and it cost a fortune to design and build which made it even more difficult for people to get behind. Nowadays the spaces and facades visible to the public are in need of some renovation, so it's looking a little worse for wear...

No Fixed Abode

I visited the Interior Design & Art Fair in the RDS last weekend, and head and shoulders above the rest of the stands was that of nofixedabode.ie. Peter and Sarah McCann run the online (and occasionally pop-up) design shop, stocking work by a number of different designers from here and abroad, including Peter himself. Some of my favourites on display at the RDS were these cushions by Scottish designer Donna Wilson:

Images via No Fixed Abode

Looking After Things

Partly because of a conversation I had on Saturday with Aisling from Raindrops on Kittens, and partly because it's been a long time coming, I spent this bank holiday Monday polishing shoes and altering clothes. Above left is my Favourite Pair of Jeans Probably Ever that I'd recently worn a giant hole in. Now they're patched up and ready to face another season. The campers are now freshly waxed, and the brogues are whitened up to a dazzling degree. Below is a pair of jeans that needed taking in at the waist, and while I was at it, I thought I'd shorten them (cue a hemming lesson from my mum). Lastly, the sandals needed some gluing in parts cos the straps were coming apart (I really need to stop buying shoes in Topshop - they cost quite a bit and yet always need repairing so soon after buying them...)

Camper

(Image via Camper)

Spanish company Camper make some of the comfiest shoes around, without skimping on character. There's always a nice pair or two to be found in their stores (I think the mens and children's ranges usually come out on top), but it's possibly the stores themselves that are their crowning glory. I've visited a couple branches, most recently the branch in Palma on Mallorca, and rich colours, playful graphics and statement lights almost always feature. Pictured below is their flagship store in Tokyo, which seems to bring together clean Japanese minimalism and Mediterranean liveliness effortlessly. Designed by the Spanish superstar Jaime Hayón, who's been in partnership with Camper for a while now, designing stores as well as shoes, there'll be more about him to come.

¡Ay Caramba!

After a week or two of busyness-induced silence followed by an unexpected extension of my holiday in the Balaerics (thank you, Eyjafjallajökull - the funniest named volcano I'm aware of), I'm finally back to blogging, hooray!

Firstly, a look at some of the things I've been coveting while in a villa in the mountains in Mallorca:

Awesomely naff tiles. Every house should have some, but maybe not quite as many as there were here:

Made For You By Arms

Arms is a Dublin-based label who specialise in casualwear for men and women. Clean shapes, simple detailing and tasty muted colours seem to reign supreme. The top image is from their A/W09 collection, and the two smaller images are from the current S/S10 collection, and I'm lusting everything pictured. Even the stationary/office supplies. Unlucky for me (but lucky for my purse) they don't seem to have an Irish stockist now that Circus is closed :( BUT I'm told you can buy online via Bespoke Boutique. Hooray!

I'll Take The Lot

(small car plate by Paget Scott-McCarthy, €25 from the Irish Design Shop)

In my recent post on the Christmas evening in the Irish Design Shop I had a really hard time choosing which Paget Scott-McCarthy product I would include in the post. In the end I went for the bicycle scarf because it and bicycles are awesome. But then I thought about it some more and decided that if I could, I'd buy loads more of Paget's work, and seeing as blogging about it is the next best thing, I would do just that. A Cork-born textiles designer who's also been branching out into ceramics (explaining the plates), her work has a really attractive graphic quality, and I'd very much like to own some ... maybe the bike scarf ... no, the birds ... or maybe ...

A|wear Encore

As you may have gathered from before, I really like what Peter O'Brien's been doing with A|wear, but alas, his last collection for the high street store has come. Launching tomorrow (Wednesday 14th October), the A/W '09 collection is available from A|wear stores and online (where the images come from). I'm lusting after the Rita jumper and Sorcha skirt, above (€100 each), and the Utta blouse and Caoimhe peg-legged trouser, below (€80 and €100).

Danish Epilogue

i like local* returns to Denmark for a brief spell (I can never seem to leave for very long...), this time for partying, camping, chocolate consumption (in both bar and milk form) and sock shopping. Below are images of Toms chocolate, a Danish chocolate company with packaging as delicious as each packs' contents:

A-Mazing

i like local is back in Ireland (temporarily at least) and there's a lot of local design to get caught up on. I called into Awear on Henry Street today to see Peter O'Brien's summer capsule collection. It's a small but perfectly-formed collection: simple, well-tailored classic pieces, and certainly in the Henry Street branch the're really well displayed. I'm two months too late for the launch but I'm just in time for the 30-50% sale on most of the collection, and now I'm lusting after these (photos via A|wear):

Coffee and Cool

LYNfabrikken is a set of design studios, design boutique, coffee shop and all-round hip hangout on Vestergade in Århus. I've enjoyed many a coffee or ginger ale there, and have spent a lot of time fawning over the merchandise, but have yet to buy any of it. Featuring in the photo above are ceramic pieces by Rainy Days (sorry, can't find a web link or any other info on them) and below is a blazer made of reclaimed fabric by Daniel Kroh that I would very much like to own, but my mum says I need to stop buying grey clothing and she's probably right.

Danish Fashion

Not a post about Part Two or Pia Bang, but about what Danish summer weather has made me resort to. Shortly after arriving here I bought some Topshop sandals via eBay (there's a Topshop in Magasin on Immervad, but they didn't have the ones I wanted) and some wellies at the flea market on Ingerslevs Boulevard. I need both frequently, often in the same day. And so it is: the unpredictable Danish summer.